Social media treats all users the same: trusted friend or total stranger, with little or nothing in between. In reality, relationships fall everywhere along this spectrum, a topic social science has investigated for decades under the theme of tie strength.
Relationships make social media social. Yet, different relationships play different roles. Consider the recent practice of substituting social media friends for traditional job references. As one hiring manager remarked, by using social media “you've opened up your rolodex for the whole world to see.” To the dismay of applicants, employers sometimes cold call social media friends expecting a job reference “only to find that you were just drinking buddies.” Although clearly not the norm, the story illustrates a basic fact: not all relationships are created equal.
For decades, social science has made much the same case, documenting how different types of relationships impact individuals and organizations. In this line of research, relationships are measured in the currency of tie strength. Loose acquaintances, known as weak ties, can help a friend generate creative ideas or find a job. They also expedite the transfer of knowledge across workgroups. Trusted friends and family, called strong ties, can affect emotional health and often join together to lead organizations through times of crisis. Despite many compelling findings along this line of research, social media does not incorporate tie strength or its lessons. Instead, all users are the same: friend or stranger, with little or nothing in between. Most empirical work examining large-scale social phenomena agrees. A link between actors either exists or not, with the relationship having few properties of its own.